What a great read! She's an excellent writer. Highly recommended.

On that random day in July, my dad called to tell me that he watched this video, and something about it struck a chord. I remember his words so vividly I can still hear him saying them in my head.

“I watched that video you made about salt, and it was really great,” he began.

“Thanks, Dad,” I replied.

“Yeah, I was watching it, and you made me realize that salt is already inside the processed foods,” he explained.

“That’s right,” I answered, almost chuckling at his excitement about this simple revelation. My brain instantly cued the scene from the movie Zoolander in which Hansel realizes that files are kept in the computer and then throws the machine off a balcony, so he could open it up and find them.

“Well, since the salt is already in there, I stopped eating them,” he continued.

“What?” I wasn’t sure I’d heard him right.

“I stopped eating the processed foods a couple weeks ago. But I needed something else to eat, and I remembered you always saying I’m supposed to eat vegetables, so I went to the store and bought all of them,” he went on.

“What? What did you buy?” I asked, starting to realize the meaning of his words. Maybe he did throw his processed foods off the balcony.

“I bought all the vegetables. They weren’t very well labeled, so I wasn’t sure exactly what I was getting. But I think I got some kale and some chard. And I got some peppers, onions, mushrooms, and all sorts of other weird shit. I took it home and cut it all up—it took an hour there was so much of it—and I made three huge batches of stir-fry. It was beautiful, and so colorful, so I call it my Rainbow Stir-Fry. And it was delicious! I take it to work and eat it every day for breakfast and lunch. I also sauté some fish or turkey meat and eat that. After eating that all day, I’m not usually hungry for dinner.”

Laughing again, this time in disbelief, I asked, “So you’ve been eating nothing but vegetables, fish, and turkey for two weeks?”

“Yeah, and I love it! And I’ve had to poke two new holes in my belt. I think I’ll need to get new pants soon.”

She IS a great writer. And very good at manipulation!